


something borrowed

by painting



Series: Umbrella Academy [4]
Category: The Umbrella Academy (TV)
Genre: Crowded Car, Dinner With Friends trope, Domesticity, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Repaired Relationships, Sibling Bonding, Stealing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-27
Updated: 2019-05-03
Packaged: 2020-02-07 10:12:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18618526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/painting/pseuds/painting
Summary: Her brother is still sojumpyfor somebody so entrenched in the macabre, voluntarily or not, and when his shoulders drop from what had been a jolt of anxious tension as he recognizes her and relaxes, Klaus connects to Allison with imploring green eyes."Can I help you?" he says, and he has the nerve to sound a little bit offended at the interruption as though Allison is the intruder in the situation instead of the other way around.





	1. clothes

Allison's bedroom door is wide open.

Were she elsewhere -- like back home in L.A., for example -- she wouldn't be referencing her training to assume a combat stance, legs apart and muscles braced, because her house out west is plenty protected by a gate and a guard and another gate and a long driveway shrouded by a precautionary pathless forest, and nobody's sincerely threatened her livelihood for as long as she's been living there.

But here in the city? God, their home had just been attacked less than a few months ago just before the world almost ended (and then didn't), and that wasn't the first time Allison's family's lives had been ravaged on or near their own territory, either. It feels like second nature to be cautious when her space has been so crudely invaded.

Like the seasoned warrior she is, Allison doesn't speak as she steps lightly into her own domain. And that doesn't matter because she forgets how old the mansion is and how the faithless creaky floorboards have only become noisier as the place ages even further.

Her brother is still so _jumpy_ for somebody so entrenched in the macabre, voluntarily or not, and when his shoulders drop from what had been a jolt of anxious tension as he recognizes her and relaxes, Klaus connects to Allison with imploring green eyes.

"Can I help you?" he says, and he has the nerve to sound a little bit offended at the interruption as though Allison is the intruder in the situation instead of the other way around.

Allison reclaims her turf and steps in further, standing in front of her vanity as she faces her trespasser. "Can you help--? Klaus, this is _my_ room," she reminds him.

"How about-- Ah, you're right, so you can help _me,_ that's better," says Klaus like he owns the place. To be fair, Klaus says everything like he owns every place, and to be even fairer, he does do this constantly, and aside from an initial question or two, Allison has never shown much reluctance in letting him. His indirect, intrusive intimacy is so telling of that intrinsic desire to be close, but doing so by spending time together or connecting emotionally hasn't really been an option for any of them for years. In a way, Klaus helping himself to everyone's spaces and making himself right at home, using and taking what he likes without apology, acts as a surrogate for what Allison thinks they all need from each other every once in a while.

And it's an easy sacrifice to make, turning a blind eye to a few things she could easily forget she ever owned, especially to somebody like Klaus.

The sheer Nailah blouse he's slung over his shoulder looks like it's about to fall off, and he's wearing a pair of boots that Allison _thinks_ might be hers from four or five years ago, but she can't recognize them exactly and doesn't remember the two of them wearing the same size. He hasn't slipped either one on fully, his heels putting weight on the back edges and bending them inward. Allison is surprised he hasn't tripped yet.

"How long have you been in here?" she asks. "I was only at the pharmacy for an hour and a half."

"Oh, definitely not _that_ long," says Klaus, who Allison knows is able to leave a room looking like he'd never been there at all and has still chosen to leave one of her drawers open with a pair of tights hanging off of its side to act as a souvenir of his presence. He pulls a scarf off of one of the hooks on her wall and waves it at her. "You left a lot of stuff back here, Allison, I'm surprised. Unless you own two of everything, an identical copy of your lavish wardrobe waiting for you back in sunny California."

Allison smiles and crosses her arms. She's always missed Klaus in a way that's different from the others. The reliability of his humble, convival, stubbornly affectionate nature provides a solace that Allison's never been able to find anywhere else. 

"And you waited until the day after my flight arrived to raid it all?" she asks him.

"Are you kidding me? I couldn't come in here while you were _gone,_ " Klaus says, the last word dipped in a deep, scandalized falsetto. "So heartbreaking, _frangine chéri,_ I think I would have missed you too much." 

 _That_ isn't true, but Allison plays along. "I was only gone for six weeks," she says.

"And you're back for how long? Only one. Must you spoil our beautiful _retrouvailles_ with your grisly reminders, Allison?" Klaus pulls the scarf over his shoulders and scrambles to catch the wayward blouse when it finally falls. "All right, since you're here. What do you think," he says, draping it over his skinny outstretched arm like a curtain on a rod, "of these pieces together?"

The ditsy print headband he's tied up around the crown of his boisterous dark curls hasn't seen the light of day since Allison was twelve, and she notices lawless dusky locks both poking out above and flattened underneath its raspy fabric. Somehow, Klaus always manages to find bits and pieces from the early years of Allison's life and fasten them upon himself while she's not looking. Although he's wearing this one askew, it doesn't really look out of place. She wonders if he positioned it that way on purpose.

Allison approaches him and reaches up to readjust it, the edges of a laugh pulsating lightly in her chest but not yet coming entirely to fruition.

"Oh! I forgot about that one, thanks," he says.

"It's crooked," Allison tells him.

"You don't think it looks better crooked? Superstardom's changed you, Madame Hollywood." The headband's tiny bright bow is nearly lost among the mane above his left ear. He moves away from her and bends down so he can see himself in the mirror, then he gingerly adjusts it before spinning back around and saying, "I actually meant these, though. Spec _tac_ ular, aren't they? I haven’t seen them before. You don’t wear them." 

He bends the elbow of his silk-bearing arm without much grace and grabs it with the other hand, then reaches for something he's left in a stiff, wrinkled pile on top of the chair by Allison's bed.

As she reels back to get a better look, Allison says, "Those would look good on you. I couldn't pull them off--" 

"Ah, you're right."

"--but I think you'll need a belt to get them to stay up," she finishes, looking down at the floor with a shake of her head and a grin. Maybe it's because her own life and powers have never felt so high-stakes, but Allison has always wondered why no one else has been able to appreciate that Klaus is funny as often as she does. Even when his intention is to be annoying, which actually is most of the time, she finds herself accidentally smiling. 

She had received the flashy brocade pants Klaus is holding as a gift from a European designer years ago, but they were a size too big and not really her style so Allison sent a polite thank-you and folded them neatly to collect dust in the back of her closet. They're just ornate and bizarre enough to captivate her brother, who is just enough of the same to pull them off without a shred of ineptitude.

"Here, just a sec," she says, and Klaus steps aside to grant Allison access to her own armoire. He usually doesn't take this much from Allison at once, especially not in front of her, and it's been a long time since Allison has collaborated with Klaus on anything to do with decoration, or… anything to do with anything, she has to admit, which may have been unavoidable for a while anyway but feels unfortunate all the same. While they were growing up, he was the only one in the house she could share this kind of thing with.

Allison hands him a cream embroidered belt and Klaus takes it from her affable hands to inspect its quality.

"Are you planning on wearing these out anywhere?" she asks, hoping to give off the genuine impression of curious sister instead of suspicious hound. She doesn't know anything about what Klaus gets up to these days, now that he isn't in living in and out of clinics or flying by his friendly charm and the seat of his pants to maneuver the streets and keep the exclusive company of unpredictable delinquents -- the dangerous kind, not just pot dealers, underpass taggers, and petty thieves.

It's got to be something, though. His unrelenting electric energy is still there, his sociability and fluidity and talent in moving conversations, and you don't maintain something like that through sitting around your childhood home chattering away at your siblings.

Klaus experiments, distracted, twisting around to see whether the belt will wrap around his waist. He hums.

"I don't know," he says. "Should I?"

She decides to do it. Allison would have laughed with wide, disbelieving eyes at the idea of inviting him out anywhere substantial six months ago, but Klaus has been so much better after his attempt at sobriety and learning to try and hone his powers. He remains as the same tenacious sense of irony and aimless behavior and flailing limbs, but there's less of an edge to him, more of a lucid show of compassion like Allison remembers from him when they were kids; he's easier now, softer, becoming slowly and steadily more readable as the seven of them begin to try and trust each other just a little bit more.

"Well," Allison says, wishing her younger adult self were here to watch her now, because the person she was back then could have used a a thrill or two, "I'm taking Vanya downtown to meet up with some of my city friends tonight, if you want to come."

Klaus looks at her through the reflection in her floor-length mirror. She _does_ know him well enough to rely on a two-second glance to figure out that he's about to say yes -- but he's going to tease her about it first.

" _Wow,_ " he says, dropping the belt on her chair and facing her with a hand on his hip. "You're inviting _me_ to meet your fancy celebrity friends on your girls' night out! Pray tell, Allison, is there a twist, is there an occasion?"

"It's not a girls' night," Allison corrects. That's a 'yes'. "There will be some guys there, too."

"Oh, well then, thank God," he says, and then he scares her and winks.

If Klaus sleeps with one of her friends again, Allison is going to blast her _current_ self, saturated with nothing but regret and flecks of self-imposed shame, to Kingdom come.

One thing at a time, though. She's never been one to catastrophize. 

"So, are you coming?"

" _Goodness,_ I just don't know," Klaus says, hands on his cheeks. "Do you think I'll be able to handle the paparazzi?"

Allison rolls her eyes and says, "We're leaving at seven."

"Wait! Allison," Klaus says as she hands him the rest of his self-appointed hand-me-downs and makes the start of an effort to usher him out. "Remember to expect me back here in a few hours to get ready. I want to sample some of your perfumes."

And that's the thing about Klaus: his entitled carelessness, while at least partially genuine due to the inattentive way his mind works, is rooted in a guarded maneuver to keep Allison and the others at arm's length so as to not allow himself to fall too deep into a circumstance of appreciation in case any of it becomes lost by his own hands or taken away by any of theirs. That much is clear in the way he takes things from them and flees, expressing all sorts of familial endearments and pretending he's going to hang around but then flinching away and enacting all sorts of avoidance tactics the moment any of them shows him any form of genuine concern or offers to help him in a way he might actually need. 

"Come by a little earlier," she amends, warmth filling her up from the middle as she extends the invitation. Things could be different now, and she realizes she's excited. "I'll need some help, too. I haven't done my own makeup in a while."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> most of the time in the show when klaus said some stupid bullshit for the sake of making fun of something or being obnoxious allison was the only one who smiled


	2. friends

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> warning for some references to drug addiction and sex in this chapter (nothing graphic).

Allison's friend Sharmine is gorgeous, but good Lord is she getting in the way.

Well, not Sharmine herself, she's not to blame, she hasn't done anything wrong-- Klaus doesn't think-- but she's being haunted by a fussy and meddlesome old lady who Klaus thinks might be her grandmother because of the way she keeps tutting and scowling and shaking her head in disapproval at Sharmine's every last move. She isn't even doing anything bad, she's just flirting with some dude who seems really into it whenever he remembers to look at her instead of his menu, even though everyone has already ordered. For some reason, he's treating the thing like a mystery novel and would probably get lost in the captivating details of the house specials if people didn't keep pulling him out to talk. Maybe Sharmine likes a challenge.

But this guy is too much of a challenge, apparently. She can’t keep him engaged and nothing else Sharmine has done all night has been good enough for the old biddy, which is by no means limited to the way she talks to suitors. That seems to be the ghost’s primary concern.

And it is so, so, so fucking distracting for Klaus to listen to a grouchy eighty-year-old lady with a penetrating singsong voice scolding a modern woman for dropping F-bombs while all he's doing is innocently sitting in a plush velvet sapphire chair and trying to eat calamari. And he's stuck right here, too, exactly like this, because it's not like he can talk back and tell her to be quiet (which he actually doubts would work. She seems stubborn) or even indicate to the table that she's there at all, because nothing _ruins a mood_ more quickly than saying to somebody: "hey, how long ago did your grandmother pass away? Because I can see dead people and boy is she sure **loving** haunting you!"

It's not a problem, though, because Klaus doesn't really want to talk about it anyway. 

What he does want, more desperately than he's ever wanted anything, is something to turn the volume down. And that's out of the question, obviously, (don't think about it), and Allison's friend Darryl is sober, too, so the table's dry and Klaus is relieved of temptation and free to continue evading eye contact with the handful of patrons who he slowly realizes didn't actually come to the restaurant to eat. Hooray for small mercies.

"Try including him," Ben suggests from across the table right next to Menu Guy (what was his name?), and there's another tricky component of the situation: Klaus can't talk back to Ben without either addressing his own powers or looking like he's suffering from some sort of psychotic condition, so he has to rely only on body language and brief communicative glances to respond to his brother's ghost. He's already slipped up twice and everyone's only on their first round of appetizers, though he thinks he was able to get away with it each time because nobody said anything. "If he's talking to you, he won't be talking to her, and then maybe her grandmother will stop getting so upset."

It's not a bad idea, and Klaus really is curious about the whole menu thing, so he decides to give it a try.

" _Jonathan!_ " he says, the man's name shining through his memory just in time and feeling like brightly colored satin cascading off of his tongue, "Tear your pretty eyes from the literature for a moment, darling, I want to ask you something." 

Ben's face goes stoic and he says, "You didn't have to do it like that."

"Hi," Jonathan says. He is pretty cute; he's definitely got money and he looks like he's needed a haircut for a month. Something about the combination of power and carelessness is working for him. "What's up?"

Sharmine stops talking and her specter does, too. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Ben.

"I was just curious," Klaus says. "Can you tell us your _least_ favorite section of the menu? No, I'm serious. I am! Jonathan, I just want to find out whether a dazzling, orthodox sophisticate like you has good taste in bad taste."

Honestly, Sharmine is pretty good at talking to men, but Klaus is better. All you have to do is falsely invest yourself in one of their interests to get them talking, and after that it's smooth sailing because they sure do love to talk. He's had a lot of practice, though most of the time he probably doesn't need it. Klaus knows his strengths.

"Do you know how to interact with anyone without manipulating or flirting with them?" asks Ben. Probably not, Klaus thinks, and he doesn't see a problem with any of it, so he flashes Ben a shrug of a facial expression to tell him: _So what?_ "Don't look at _me._ Look at him!"

"The side dishes," Jonathan says. Klaus frowns, thinking maybe he missed something. He still nods like he really cares. "The typeface was inconsistent."

Nope, no idea.

"Well that's just preposterous," he replies, making sure Jonathan knows how much he doesn't mean it.

Jonathan smiles like he wants to laugh but doesn't. "I'm a graphic designer," he explains. 

Okay. Makes sense. "A good graphic designer or a trust fund graphic designer?" Klaus asks next.

That seems to set off Allison's radar, because her attention shoots away from the glitzy conversation she's having across the table to give Klaus the biggest warning-eyes he's seen from her since they were kids and she caught him trying to switch out his uniform's thick-banded wristwatch for hers, which was much thinner and prettier and suited him much better. He wonders if he sat him here near the edge within her line of vision so she could monitor him tonight. The table really isn't that big. 

"I like to think I'm pretty good," says Jonathan with a calm smile, which means Klaus is off the hook. Allison lets him go.

"I bet. Do you graphically design menus?" asks Klaus.

"I graphically design all sorts of things," he answers, and what's going on now is that Jonathan might be trying to act seductive while discussing graphic design. He'd just lowered his voice and that sounded pretty nice.

Sharmine can't take it. She grabs Klaus by his arm like he's an anchor, _hello,_ and while her touch isn't unwelcome, Klaus knows she's either using him as a physical affection stepping stone as she paddles into the conversation or she's about to flirt with Klaus to try and make Jonathan jealous. Or maybe she means it and wants Klaus to join in on whatever she's trying to do with Jonathan. And while that wouldn't be the first time something like that happened to him, he doesn't much prefer sex with women and, more importantly, getting involved with Sharmine in absolutely any way is going to burden Klaus with nothing but a guaranteed, hideous, uninvited and monstrously annoying mega-haunting.

It wouldn't have been a big deal to Klaus several months ago -- it wouldn't have even crossed his mind, he probably would have gone for it -- but now that he's unsealed the protective inebriation he'd held onto for half his life and returned his consciousness to its natural, oh-so-virtuous state of already being haunted by every fucking ghost that’s ever been cursed to walk the earth, none of that is even remotely worth the risk.

"Aw, what a fun coincidence," Sharmine says while Klaus silently chants _I don't want to fuck your granddaughter I don't want to fuck your granddaughter I don't want to fuck your granddaughter_ and hopes the old woman frowning at him can read his mind. You never know. "It's such stimulating work, isn't it? I actually consulted on the design of an MGM cast announcement last season."

"Did you?" Jonathan asks, his voice conveying interest even though his expression hazes out, eyes half lidded and unfocused. "I've heard they're great. Have you done any other projects recently?"

That's right, Klaus remembers from a long time ago. People in celebrity circles love to talk about _projects,_ because none of them actually need to work.

Sharmine says something about the studio. Jonathan says something back. Sharmine squeezes Klaus and says something else and so on and so forth -- he's not really paying attention even though Ben's looking at him nervously like he's supposed to, but it's just impossible so he isn't going to wear himself out trying. The shift in arrangement distracts him as the ghost circles the table with her eyes fixed on Klaus so she can get a better look at him. It doesn't seem like she knows he can see her. Usually they figure it out pretty fast, but she must be preoccupied and he hopes she stays that way because sometimes the spirits will turn impatient and start getting pissed off at him for no good reason. 

"You want this one instead," she insists as she aggressively points at him. "So handsome, and he won't spoil you rotten."

Oh, Jesus, but that's so much worse.

It's ironic that Klaus is the one that can hear her instead of Sharmine, but not ironic enough for him to play around with, so all he does is make eye contact with Ben to show him how bad of an idea this was and then resolve to focus only in the other direction of the table where everything appears to be ghost-free. 

He almost knocks into Vanya because he whips around so quickly. She's been sitting in the chair on his left, leaning with her elbow on the table and the side of her jaw in her hand, but her back has been facing him so he assumed she was happily engaging with whatever conversation is happening on the other side. With his attention concentrated her way, though, Klaus notices that she's quiet and distant and has filled her plate with food from the platter of hors d'oeuvres and not touched them.

As lightly as he can, Klaus rubs her shoulder. Vanya lifts her head up and turns to look at him.

"You okay?" he says, keeping his voice soft and low and conversational. She probably is, but she seemed bored and it never hurts to ask. It might give them something to talk about.

Bashfully, Vanya smiles. "Yeah," she says. "I just never really know how to talk to these people."

Klaus didn't even think about that. His poor introverted sister.

He smiles back and hopes it's reassuring. "Oh, me neither," he promises. "Yeah, they're tricky." 

"You don’t seem to be having any trouble," Vanya says, but it's more encouraging than anything -- there’s no bitterness there. 

And she's right; he's stealing the show whenever he can get his head clear enough to get a word in, but that doesn't mean he's not out of place. Unlike Vanya, though, Klaus can't seem to mind something like that. He knows he's talented at playing chameleon and has over a decade's experience working it in his favor, often powered by talent and motivated by survival. It feels natural to do. Always has.

"I've even met them a few times before," Vanya continues. "Allison always tries to include me in the stuff they're talking about, but… we just don't have a lot in common, I guess."

"That doesn't have to be a problem."

"It's just-- our temperaments are so different. Are you okay?" 

Shit. Klaus rips his apprehensive, traitorous wandering gaze off of the dodgy corpse a few tables over that keeps roaming suspiciously closer to the edge of their own and says, "Yep, terrific."

Someone laughs next to him and he isn't sure if it's Sharmine or her grandmother or an uninvited newcomer. He's guessing the former, because the ghosts aren't usually very joyful, but he isn't trusting his intuition tonight. 

"It's okay," says Ben neutrally, presumably reading his body language. Klaus wants to sigh at him.

"Sorry, lots of people hanging around the place," Klaus says to Vanya instead. He grins at her so she doesn't get sad about it and dampen him, because he isn't interested in trying to handle that right now. Klaus has to remind himself that he's been dealing with this in as many ways as he can for his entire life, but people like Vanya aren't yet desensitized to the tragedy of it all and need to be taught how to cope with it through dismissive sarcastic wit. "The rich and famous have such _dark_ histories."

"Oh, shit," says Vanya. So that didn't work. "I'm sorry."

"Nah, it's fine." Like, it's not, but Klaus never knows what to say to something like that. He's been trying to get used to the ghosts as he learns how to conjure and cast them, and it's not the same profoundly torturous experience that it had been before, but seeing so many of them at once is still unfamiliar and it's really _loud,_ which is overwhelming on its own but even worse when he's in his element trying to socialize. Klaus has always been good at that, at least.

Vanya's sensitive, though. She looks both ways before asking Klaus another question, the animated dialogue on either side of them acting as a secure display of the way Number Four and Number Seven have become their own little island of outsiders.

"You've gotten better at sending them away and having it last for a little while, haven't you?" she asks.

"For a little while," Klaus agrees. It's a cute question. "But I don't think Allison is ready for me to start glowing blue in front of her fancy hometown friends. Could you imagine?" 

Finally, Vanya grins.

"I almost wish you would," she says.

"Maybe next time," he muses, like he’s really considering it. "Even the playing field, knock them off of their game a little? Might be fun."

"Yeah." Vanya sort of laughs but then decides she's done playing. "It was nice of you to come," she says with a glance in Allison’s direction. "It means a lot to her."

"I wanted to. I’m having a good time, promise," Klaus says. He'd much rather see ghosts while he's with his sisters and a bunch of somebodies than see ghosts somewhere else by himself. The living company is so grounding for him, especially in a place like this that's crowded enough for Klaus to sometimes have trouble knowing whether he's accurately differentiating between the two worlds. He tilts his head and rests it on his hand, like Vanya was doing earlier. "Is that why you do it?"

Vanya looks past Klaus, contemplative, her eyebrows set straight across as she frowns. She doesn't need to answer. 

Klaus can hear that Sharmine and Jonathan are getting along, finally (you're welcome), and the ghost hovering over Sharmine has gotten closer to giving up, ceasing her commentary in lieu of expressing dozens of scoffs and grunts to communicate her disapproval. Klaus keeps his back turned to that side of the table just in case she sees his face and remembers how badly she wants Sharmine to touch his arm again. He's been trying his best to tune them out, but that shrill soprano is hard to ignore, and the threshold is shattered when some other dead lady from that direction suddenly goes into a panic about the injustices of her smoldering death, or something. He pays more attention to the outburst's sudden volume than to its content.

He must have flinched, because Vanya brings her eyes back over to catch Klaus' and says, "Hey. Are you…?"

"Yeah, I'm good, sorry." Sorry, sorry, sorry. But Klaus is close to his breaking point as the lot of them become harder and harder to ignore. He can't keep talking about it and he can't keep being quiet, so he rubs the top of her forearm in preemptive apology, leans further into the table, and loudly, heedlessly, successfully recaptures the conversation.

If he’s lucky, the most prominent voice in the room will soon become his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> he's going to be okay! night's still young


	3. time and space

While Klaus invites two of Allison's friends to share a long ride back to the upper east corner of the city with them, Vanya leans against the hard metal door of Allison's car and wonders if he was meant to be a siren.

She used to think about it sometimes, while they were growing up, after she'd decided to engage with an encyclopedia of Greek mythology when given the liberty to choose her own electives. At the time, Vanya used literature as a peaceful escape, employing it as a distraction from the melancholy of her isolation and thus a place where she'd separate herself from any thoughts having to do with her family or the Umbrella Academy.

But while she was reading about Jason and the Argonauts, Vanya couldn't help breaking her boundary before she knew it as her mind flooded with thoughts of Klaus. The effortless luring of people toward their presence with a perilous disregard for any subsequent destruction reminded her so starkly of the way Klaus could captivate anyone he chose to speak to, his wit and timing and warmth keeping them feeling entertained and safe and special in a way most people probably never had.

" _Come_ on, Stretch. It feels like fate, right? Your car gets towed and we have two empty seats in ours? Oh, don't tell me you're going to let them go to waste! I'm not ready to say goodbye to you yet."

The two of them didn't spend a lot of time together while they lived in the same house, but Vanya watched Klaus at ceremonies and on TV and had sometimes felt specifically jealous of the way he could snatch strangers' hearts while he spawned an upheaval of trouble right before their unabashedly smitten eyes.

He also knows how to use it to his advantage, as a tool or maybe even as a weapon, by omitting the sincerity from his interactions. That's where latter parallel to the sirens could attach itself, and Vanya knows Klaus isn't above such a devious maneuver; manipulation by way of charm for the sake of nothing but personal desires. He's plenty capable. Most of the time, he seems to have a slippery sort of control of his own dimmer switch.

Honey-tongued, Pogo had called him once. It was meant to be disparaging instead of complimentary.

"Okay," agrees Anthony, who's awfully cheerful for somebody with "call the impound" sitting high and dreadful on their immediate do-do list, "but only if I get to drive."

Vanya always found solace in knowing that not all sirens have to lead people to their demise.

Anthony holds out his hand and bends the tips of his fingers to gesture for Klaus to give him the keys. His cocky expression turns stupefied as Klaus grabs his hand, pulls himself closer, puts the other arm around Anthony's shoulder and then nods his head toward Allison.

"My lovely sister drove us here, _actually,_ " he says, then pats Anthony on the back before he releases him and floats a couple feet away, swaying like a stiff willow in the breeze. Anthony should really be used to him by now. "You'll have to ask her. Uh, Allison?"

He's been doing that all night, deferring decisions to both her and Vanya, referencing at least one of them at what seems to be every one of his many turns. It had been marveling to watch him transition from the wayside to the spotlight after concluding his dialogue with her at the table, clearly aware that Vanya's short of such an ability and easily finding places in their conversations to include her anyway. It's a change of pace for Vanya and she's still getting used to it, oftentimes searching her reserves for a meaningful assertion to contribute to the group and finding cobwebs instead.

Allison's been handling it much better than Vanya has.

"You gonna wreck my car, Ant?" she asks with a challenging smirk. Part of it might be because they've already established a rapport, but Allison has a solid and approachable energy that may be different from Klaus' but consistently gets her similar results.

"Like the Titanic, baby," says Anthony. Allison tosses him the keys and he catches them easily.

With Anthony in the driver's seat, the rest of the car's arrangements barely need figuring out. While Anthony is plenty tall with several inches on Klaus, Allison dwarfs his roommate Darryl. So that's fine. Vanya's used to sitting in the middle when things get crowded, and she's experienced worse than sharing a backseat bench packed between her sister and a man she'd met at five preceding events and only spoken to at one of them.

Klaus stops Allison as she reaches for the handle next to Vanya's elbow.

"Yooouu sit up front," he offers, stretching and wobbling his words. "They're your friends."

Allison's on her way to ditching her own specific expression of Klaus-driven skepticism, but she isn't quite there yet. They're still getting used to the idea of letting their guard down around him in the company of strangers. She tilts her head at his sacrifice and says, "All right." 

Anthony bulldozes before she has a chance to open the door. "Sorry, people. Darryl takes precedence as navigator," he says.

With a hand on the chiffon covering her hip, Allison says, "Why's that?"

Darryl, who's already at the front of the car about to assume his station, scans a hand down his entire body and says, "Motion sickness." That's legitimate, so Allison just shrugs and watches Anthony open the driver's side door.

"Umbrella Academy in the back," he dictates, and that stings for a reason Vanya isn't able to place. She looks to her brother and sister whose gazes are on the driver and the passenger, respectively, which tells Vanya that she'd been alone in feeling it.

"Vanya, here," Allison says, a hand on Vanya's back as she guides her around the car to the left side. "You sit behind Anthony. You don't need as much leg room."

The backseat of her car is a bell-curved spacious bench with cool tan interior to match the front, still clean and smooth even after seeing over a decade of action. Vanya doesn't ever remember sitting back there, having only spent time with Allison one-on-one since they'd moved out on their own until tonight, and then it had been Klaus who volunteered to take up the entire space on his own during the drive down to what he kept referring to as 'the party district'.

"Sure, that makes sense," says Vanya. She gets in.

Allison returns to the open door on the right side of the car where Klaus is standing, but neither one of them moves. Allison gestures toward it, palm up.

"Go on," she says.

" _Me?_ " says Klaus.

"It's my car," argues Allison.

Klaus exhales that vocal sort of groan-sigh that he likes to perform whenever he wants to act like he's doing somebody a huge favor, then he and his spindly arms and legs crawl in and settle down next to Vanya, pressing in further when Allison slides into the seat next to him and shuts the door.

When his restlessness kicks in two seconds later, Klaus stretches out for as much as the confined space allows and then leans forward so his head is between the two front seats.

"What's the music situation?" he asks. "Do you like to listen to anything good? Anything boring?"

Allison swats at his side and says, "Seatbelt." 

Klaus thumps back against the leather and struggles terrifically with the strap.

"We're slaves to the radio, I'm afraid," says Darryl, politely pulling his seat up so Allison can spread out, too. She keeps her legs crossed, so Klaus takes advantage of the extra room, straightening out his right knee and putting his foot down next to hers. He always seems to sit in a way that's either claustrophilic, folded up and contorted in a way that never looks comfortable, or fully limp and expanded, like he's trying to touch something invisible that's just out of his reach. "Not even the top 100. I'm talking top 25. Our house isn't very sophisticated."

"Nothing wrong with that, Superfan," says Klaus. He tugs and jerks and eventually clicks the seatbelt across his chest, then puts it to the test when he stretches it with a forward bend at the waist. "Actually, all we have in here is the radio, so how's that? It's like you were _meant_ to ride in here tonight. It was written in the stars. You should just play what you like, I think, you've had such a rough evening."

Anthony pulls out onto the street and Darryl says, "No we haven't."

"Your car was towed," Vanya says.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot rich people don't care about that," Klaus tells her. "Do you? Ow, _ow,_ Allison, _what?_ "

Vanya can't see her, but she can _hear_ Allison rolling her eyes as she says, "Sorry he keeps talking about money. You grew up affluent, too, you know."

"Yeah, then I ruled the streets for thirteen years," Klaus says. All of his nods toward wealth over the night have been appreciably nimble; he hasn't made a single accidental _faux pas._ Klaus is smarter than that, Vanya's observed, especially now that he's got a clear head. "I've seen it all."

"The honesty's refreshing," Anthony says. Vanya notices he doesn't acknowledge Klaus' mention of his sordid past.

"See? The honesty's refreshing."

Klaus knows what he's doing. Vanya's seen others do the same before, at her performance receptions, pointing out a disparity of wealth to illustrate a power differential and make the other person feel charitable based on their company alone. Men feel big when they think they're taking care of somebody, and they like being around people who make them feel big.

Klaus has seen it too, no doubt. He loves people and loves that people love him, and he's unforgettable to most of those he splashes his charm onto even though he probably won't think of most of them unless prompted into a memory after they say goodbye. There's no reason to assume Allison's friends would be any different, but Klaus seems to be having fun with them for real, which means he probably doesn't even know the extent to which he's doing it. And there it is again -- a natural, innate susceptibility to being adored, his calculated compliments enticing and incarcerating these men exactly like a siren's song.

"Oh! Stay off the expressway!" he requests over channel 96.7's thunderous advertisement for the shady jewelry store near Vanya's apartment. "Let's take it scenic, see the lights and sights. You aren't in any hurry, are you?"

"Not anymore," says Darryl.

"It's only half-past midnight, after all," agrees Anthony. "The night is young."

"Yeah, young when you're twenty-two," Allison says.

Klaus lets his thirty-year-old joints pop, almost definitely on purpose, as he readjusts his posture to address Allison.  "Or a famous movie star," he says. "All of your galas last until like four in the morning."

"They do not," says Allison.

"Yes? The one I went to did," says Klaus.

"I didn't know you went to a gala," Vanya says. She knows she isn't getting the story tonight, but she'll remember to ask before Allison flies back out west. Klaus has been quite the liability until very recently and she wonders what had motivated Allison to invite him along.

"It 'lasted' until four in the morning because you crashed two of the after-parties," Allison reminds him. That sounds about right. "The event was done at eleven-thirty and I had to spend the whole night trying to track you down."

"Yeah, I went to the one a few years ago," Klaus says to Vanya. One of his arms is stretched across the back of the bench now and he tilts his head back as he tries to recall. "The one about, uh, I think it was a charity…?"

"Environmentalism," Allison says.

"Yeah! _Environmentalism._ " Klaus has a tendency to make all of his agreements sound so encouraging. It reminds Vanya of a schoolteacher praising an eight-year-old for correctly solving a multiplication problem on the board, like he's so happily and disproportionately excited about it. "Your Hollywood friends are _so_ much wilder than your friends here, do you notice that very much?"

"They were also twenty-six or younger when you met them."

"Okay, that's not so different. How old are you guys? You can't be that far off from us."

Anthony says, "I'm thirty-four."

Darryl says, "Guess."

"Uh, sixty-eight," Klaus replies instantly. Anthony cackles as he makes a risky left-turn onto an empty boulevard. The car jostles to the right and Vanya grips the roof handle to keep from knocking into her brother. 

" _Sixty-eight?_ " repeats Darryl.

"Am I off?" asks Klaus. "Older or younger?"

"I'm thirty-two!"

"Nice! So I was close," celebrates Klaus. Then, he says, "You didn't say it had to be a good guess. You just seem like such a silver fox."

Darryl laughs for just a second and says, "My hair is black."

"Plenty of salons in the city, _mon grand._ So many talented colorists."

"Ugh, no, God, not yet," says Darryl. "Maybe one day. Hopefully not too soon."

"Oh, no, you should leave it grey when it finally goes," Klaus says. He wouldn't be going this far with it if it wasn't clear that Darryl was relishing the attention. "You'll look amazing in salt and pepper. So handsome."

When he reaches up to touch Darryl's hair -- not for the first time tonight, on account of his friendly disregard for personal space and Darryl's merry allowances -- Allison clears her throat and grabs his wrist.

"Why didn't you decide to take a cab tonight?" she asks the spellstruck men up front, her diversion obvious and sloppy and perfect. Vanya has no idea how she does that. "Parking sucks downtown."

"Ha! They know that now," says Klaus, unflappable, waiting for Allison unleash him.

"Why did you decide to take on parking downtown, then, huh?" asks Anthony.

Allison shrugs and says, "I like to drive." 

"Well, me too." 

"There's something special about the tall buildings and tight streets that we don't get in L.A.," Allison continues. "It's weird to say because it's so cramped, but driving here just feels easier."

Allison always brings in a treasure chest of pent-up complaints about L.A. when she lands in the city in the form of compliments to her hometown. She always points out so many things she misses that she can't get out west, but as soon as she's back in Hollywood, she's full of sentiments about how happy she is to be home. Vanya doesn't think she's fair-weathered; it's a sign of flexibility, illustrating an ability to focus on appreciating what surrounds her in the present.

It's best categorized as mindful optimism, at least where her environment is concerned, punctured only by her tendency toward occasional wariness.

But that's understandable, most of the time. Vanya recognizes that it's borne from a protective instinct and only means her sister isn't blind.

"Allison," Klaus says only a handful of beats later, somber-serious with disapproval, elbows resting on his knees and jaw in his hands as his eyes traverse from window to window. "You jinxed us."

"Shit," she says. "Well? You were the one who wanted to go scenic."

They spend the next hour and a half stuck in traffic. Unsurprisingly, the jam begins on a narrow one-way street, and Darryl doesn't seem to mind the stop-and-go one bit. Maybe the front seat is good for him after all. It's awfully late for the roads to be this held-up, practically at a standstill, and Vanya suspected a pile-up of motor wreckage before they found out they'd all gotten stuck due to a special occasion at the theatre and poor gridlock planning. It isn't common to experience one of these off of the expressway and Vanya doesn't think she ever has, not even in the car following behind the rest of her siblings as they were chauffeured separately to their mission sites. It's strange to essentially remain stationary for so long as flocks of dolled-up pedestrians pass them by over and over again.

Being stuck in traffic with company is better than being stuck in traffic alone, even in Vanya's opinion, and nobody complains even when a biker -- cycle, not motor -- weaves between the traffic lines and Anthony almost hits him (aside from a brief collective panic before the energy returns to its stasis, and about a million congratulations from Klaus). The lack of speed means no accelerated winds and an allowance to put the windows down for some air and absorption of the surrounding sidewalks' excitement.

That barely lasts for an hour, unfortunately, despite Klaus' efforts to keep the party going. Everyone's tired. Vanya has seen him sober-version-exhausted a few times before, quiet and low, so she knows it's possible. She wouldn't believe so otherwise, because the rest of the time he seems like one of those tilting dolls that wobbles every which way at the slightest breeze but always pops right back up instead of falling over completely, even if it grazes the floor.

From what Vanya can tell, tonight acts as another testament to the mirage of his endless reserves. She closes her own eyes after a while as the world of the car and beyond becomes vague and fuzzy, but she's ordained to feel Klaus continually shifting or drumming or moving some part of his body in one way or another. Even during his longer periods of stillness, she never notices his muscles relax.

Vanya wakes up with her cheek cold against the window while Klaus gently taps her. It feels a lot like his normal touch, possible that he isn't being so delicate with her on purpose.

"Hello, Vanya, _helloooo,_ " he says, either as a greeting or a prompt for her to open her eyes. Vanya isn't sure which. Could be both. His voice is softer now, but he still sounds like he's in high spirits. Vanya totes her own body forward, peeking at him as she sits up. "All right, there you are. Do you want Allison to take you back to your apartment or do you want to crash here?"

"It's late," Vanya answers. "That's okay. I can sleep in my old bed."

"Okay," he says quickly, then clambers out of the backseat before he knocks on the roof of the car and Vanya hears the creak of the opposite side door. "Then welcome home, Sis," he alerts her and politely swings it shut.

Vanya gets herself together, mouth dry and eyes sticky, and follows him out. She can't decide whether she should try and preserve the half-asleep sensibility to make it easier for her to pass out when she lands upstairs in a few moments, or open her eyes all the way so she can interact properly with her siblings before they all disperse. It appears to be out of her control when she feels herself elevating into the latter as the cool, damp air in the garage cradles the exposed skin on her face. 

As the three of them enter what will ambivalently always be their home, shoes clacking on the marble in the foyer, Allison faces Vanya and says, "You can sleep in something of mine tonight. Klaus, I want that shirt back." 

Klaus begins to unbutton it posthaste.

"Oh my God, just-- you can give it back to me tomorrow," Allison says. Her tone is urgent, but she's smiling. Klaus only shrugs and spins around, arms swinging, so he can sweep himself toward the kitchen. "Aren't you going to bed?"

Klaus stops. "Huh? Oh, no," he says pleasantly. "I just-- uh-- nah, not yet. I'll catch you tomorrow, though. Get some rest now, you two! You'll need it for when you make me breakfast. I want to be surprised."

That's his goodbye. He waves one at them for good measure, treading fluidly down the hall, his silken sleeves billowing in the breeze his speed creates. He could at least go and hang out in his room, Vanya thinks, if he doesn't want to sleep. There isn't much to do in the house aside from rummaging through Dad's old things, and Klaus already seems to have taken inventory three times over. 

"I'm surprised," says Allison once Klaus is out of sight. They see a light flip on from his direction. "He's been waking up pretty early the whole time I've been here."

"I don't think he sleeps a lot," Vanya tells her. Allison just hums.

"Kind of heartening that he's still the same even without the drugs," she observes as they start to head up the stairs. "He was so much less manageable than I expected, but I think it would have been unsettling otherwise."

They hear Klaus' voice from far away, made soft and unintelligible by the distance and the walls, his petulant tone an indicator that Ben's at least around to entertain him.

"I think he was sort of struggling," Vanya says at the reminder.

"What do you mean?" Allison lowers her voice when they get to the top and move through the hallway. Luther and Five must be asleep by now.

"He said he was seeing a lot of-- um, like, ghosts-- in the restaurant," Vanya relays.

"Really? I couldn't tell," says Allison, but then she pauses to really recollect and reconsider as she slowly and thoughtfully opens her bedroom door. "Actually, yeah, maybe at a couple points, but it didn't seem that bad."

"He seemed kind of freaked out," Vanya confesses. "I was sitting next to him and he kept veering off and getting really tense. Do you know what they look like?"

"No," Allison admits. "I never asked." 

"Yeah, me neither."

Klaus had never seemed to want to talk about it. She wonders whether he would open up if somebody knocked.

The yoga pants and t-shirt Allison loan to her are stiff from their newness, never worn and probably never washed but still carrying a murmur of Allison's perfume from the way they were packed in a drawer with other pieces from her scent-laden wardrobe. Vanya isn't used to wearing clothes that smell like anything, and whatever has wafted onto these instantly reminds her of being wedged next to Klaus in the backseat just a few minutes ago. The same essence of powdery florals and delicate, sweet spices had been illuminating him in a similar way.

Vanya gathers her things while Allison sits down in front of her mirror and starts to wipe off her makeup.

"Do you think that's why he talks so much?" asks Vanya after a moment.

"Klaus? Because of the…?"

"Yeah."

Allison scoffs fondly. "I think he'd be like that with or without the psychic powers," she says.

"Yeah." Vanya approaches the door and pulls it back open. "You're probably right. See you in the morning? …What's so funny?"

As she takes her hair down, Allison says, "Klaus is going to wake you up before me. He usually gets bored around eight-thirty and your room is closer."

With her hand on the doorframe, Vanya asks, "Does he do that to you?"

"He seems to always do it to somebody."

"And you let him?"

Allison tilts her head down and looks at Vanya knowingly.

"It's Klaus," is all she says (and all she has to say).

Before she says goodnight and shuts Allison's door slowly until it latches, rebounds to her native four walls of bittersweet memories, and cocoons herself in the deflated comforter atop her always-too-firm twin bed for the first time in a long time, Vanya crinkles a smile as she says, "Fair point," and plans on doing the same.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope everyone kept thinking about how vanya and allison's _actual_ powers can perfectly function as parallels to a siren song too. maybe it's more special on klaus because it's not magical. it's just how he is


End file.
